"mark" asked:

What's the smart way to shell walnuts, I've got lots.
There has to be a better way than sitting down with nutcrackers and
spending ages to produce a tiny heap of bits.

Nutcrackers! You should be so lucky. We have lost ours and it appears that
they are fast becoming a thing of the past. I recently spent a whole morning
looking for nutcrackers, finishing up at Lakeland where I found a few.
Last year, a bag of walnuts I bought had a diamond shaped metal walnut
opener. It worked well on most of the nuts, but we still had to smash a few
with a hammer. One store I visited had a very impressive display of nuts,
but no nutcrackers. When I asked if they had any, I was told that the
Christmas period hadn't really started as yet. but they would be having a
few in November.

MD